Show HN: Plastron – A spreadsheet you grow into an app, in one index.html

2 points

2 hours ago

Plastron is a spreadsheet starting with one cel (元) whose formula generates the a readme DOM element but you can make sheets of cels with formulas like =cels(8, 5). It's a single index.html — no build, no server, no install — so it runs locally, offline, and free. Excel is maybe the most useful software ever written, but the moment a sheet wants to be a real app — a UI, a file, a database, something to share — you fall off a cliff and rewrite it as "a real application" (framework + backend + deploy), usually after pleading with IT over licenses. Meanwhile every browser already runs JS, WASM, SQLite, and a filesystem API. An index.html should be all you need.

Things to try on the page: =cels("anim", 2, 1, at("a1", "=def(\"ball\", \"js\", \"i => [30+280Math.abs((i/20)%2-1), 30+200Math.abs((i/14)%2-1)]\")"), at("a2", "=simulate(\"ball\", 120)"))

=cels("data", 2, 1, at("a1", "=db(\"app\")"), at("a2", "=sql(\"app\", \"create table t(a,b); insert into t values (1,2),(3,4); select * from t\")"))

Imagine somebody dm'ing you a formula for some bs b2b saas app

It's early and meant to be built on. I'm sure there are bugs. No version control yet, no .xlsx import/export, and the traditional Excel formula set isn't there.

Code (MIT): https://github.com/rheophile10/plastron

also you can still play free doom at this vestigial stub https://plastron.ca/os/

I benched plastron against krausests library https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45259345 and you can see the first pass version of plastron there

https://github.com/krausest/js-framework-benchmark/pull/2015

This afternoon I PR'd the more recent plastron. It has some modest improvements https://github.com/krausest/js-framework-benchmark/pull/2029

Thanks @1v100000 @mynamebedan @lionkimbro for ill-advised encouragement

Thanks to @Ki_fun_thoughts for entertaining conversations about what thought bubbles of spiderman would look like in a more perfect world

Thanks to Claude and Grok who laboured with this prompt: "make me spreadsheet... masterpiece"

Thank you for reading this. Now give me cruel and harsh criticism in the comments. Or steal this app and do what I was trying to do better than I could.

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DRFytotD2hV/?hl=en

@Ki_fun_thoughts wiki: https://www.tinygnomes.com/qwiki.cgi?mode=previewSynd&uuid=W...